Category: Messianic 101

To Torah, or Not to Torah: OY! What a Question!

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I don’t know where to start on this one, or where it may end. I could probably write a book about this (hmmmm??), but I want to keep it simple, so here I go…

As I have said often, eating ham will not send me to Sheol (the Hebrew word for Hell), and not eating ham will not guarantee me a place in heaven. My sins are forgiven by the sacrifice of Messiah Yeshua, so the Torah, which tells me what is a sin and what isn’t a sin (Shaul says in the book of Romans that the Torah actually created sin, in that it defined it) helps me to act in ways that please God, but no longer really keeps me from death because my sins have been, and will continually be, forgiven through Yeshua. Therefore, there is an argument that can be made that it is no longer absolutely necessary to keep the Torah.

BUT…just because we can make an argument doesn’t mean that the argument we make is valid.

The Torah is composed of many things: it has historical information, it has constitutional regulations, it establishes a system of societal laws and statutes that include torts resolution and a penal code, it outlines a health code, it is a marriage certificate between Jews and God, and it also outlines the procedures for how we are supposed to worship God. These laws, statutes, and regulations are commandments, not suggestions- they are direct and absolute requirements.

The justification (this term means, specifically, being forgiven of our sins) we receive through the sacrificial system defined in the Torah is no different that the justification we receive through the sacrifice of Yeshua. The process is still the same: sin, recognize and accept your sin, do T’shuvah (repentance), present your sacrifice to God and God will accept the blood of the innocent sacrifice (remember that the life is in the blood) as a substitution for your lifeblood. That is the process outlined in Torah, and never, ever did anyone think or say that because we could always sacrifice to be forgiven that the Torah isn’t that important. Never has any Jew ever thought that.

Yeshua’s sacrifice did not do away with the sacrificial system, He only replaced the part where we have to bring the sacrifice to the Temple in Jerusalem. Everything else is the same- we sin, we own up to our sin, we repent, we sacrifice (this is the part Yeshua has provided for us) and then we ask God to forgive us by means of substituting the sacrifice’s blood for our own.

So where did someone come up with the idea that because Yeshua’s sacrifice is the only sacrifice we need that we can now do away with Torah? God never said that we could do away with Torah, and Yeshua never said we could do away with Torah, and Shaul (Paul) never said we should do away with Torah. The sacrificial system that provides salvation from sin is no different after Yeshua than it was before Him- it’s just that Yeshua is the substitute we can use instead of bringing a lamb or pigeon to the Temple. No difference otherwise, so what was valid as the way to live before Yeshua came, died and was resurrected, is still valid as the way to live

Oh wait a minute!! Shaul certainly sounded like Torah wasn’t important. I believe that this is where the ‘No Need For Torah” idea started, as a misinterpretation of Shaul’s letters to (mostly) Gentile communities of Believers (there were no churches as we know them today in the First Century.) Shaul never once thought that Torah was unimportant, and he lived it as best as any human could his entire lifetime.  Despite what humans have entitled “Paul converts on the road to Damascus” that you read as the chapter title to Acts 9, Shaul never converted to anything.  When you read his letters you see he did, in fact, go to synagogues.  he did talk to Jews, but he made it his main ministry to go to the Gentiles. He established Gentile filled Messianic communities, and what he taught was what is in Torah. The misinterpretation is rooted in the fact that his main argument was never against observance of the Torah, it was against observance of the P’shat, the literal meaning of the words, in order to achieve salvation. Shaul was not against Torah, he was against the teaching that a legalistic observance would save one’s soul. That was what the Pharisees and most of the Jewish training and understanding of the Torah was at that time- if you do what it says in the Torah, just going through the motions (so to speak) then you can be saved. In fact, if we could perform all the laws and commandments in the Torah (as Yeshua did) then we would be saved: through perfect performance we can find salvation in Torah alone.

The problem is we can’t perform Torah perfectly, so to observe Torah as the means of our salvation, is a lost cause. That is the message Shaul was relating to the Gentiles who were under stress from their old life (to remain pagans) and also from their new life, from Jews who wanted them to do everything in the Torah because if they didn’t they couldn’t be saved.

This is the same drek I get today as a Messianic Jew: Christians who have been taught Torah isn’t needed now that they have Jesus tell me if I still live as a Jew I am not really saved because I am not “under the blood”, and Jews tell me if I believe in Jesus (their understanding is that I must have converted to Christianity) then I am not a Jew anymore. Both of these teachings are absolutely wrong- as a Jewish man who believes Yeshua is my Messiah, the one God promised my people since the beginning, then I am not a Christian, and I am more than just a Jew- I am a completed Jew, in that I have come full circle, from innocence in Eden to sinfulness in the world to Messianic forgiveness through Messiah, and thereby able to commune with God, again and forever more.

So, nu? What do we have? What we have is what we were given from the start- the Torah. The Torah is how God tells us to live, and defines right from wrong, righteousness from sinfulness, and provides the means by which we can be absolved of our sins in order to come into the presence of God. Yeshua is the Messiah God sent so that we can still find forgiveness after the Temple, which is where the Torah said we had to ask for forgiveness, was destroyed. No Temple, no forgiveness, but Yeshua took care of that by becoming the Temple, Himself,and providing the innocent blood (His own blood) for us. So, Torah is still valid, Torah is still necessary, and Torah is still God’s commandment to us all.

We should all try to follow Torah: not in order to be saved, but because it is what God tells us to do. We will receive blessings for obedience and we will not be blessed if we don’t (Deuteronomy 28.)  If we ignore Torah, we are ignoring God- like it or not, that is the truth. Do we need Torah to be saved- no. Do we need to obey Torah to be saved- no. Should we try to obey Torah, anyway- yes, absolutely. Why? Because it is what God tells us to do.

If God tells you do to something, what other reason do you need to do it?

Who Dumped Who First?

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Remember back in the Old Days when we were first leaning about relationships between boys and girls? We would be attracted to each other, fall hopelessly in love, and within a few weeks or so one would dump the other for a different beau.  The argument always came down to, “Who dumped who first?”

When Yeshua (Jesus) started His ministry, announcing the Good News to the Jewish people, many Gentiles began to believe in God’s plan of salvation. They accepted Yeshua, along with (probably) hundreds of thousands of Jewish people throughout the Middle East and Asia at that time, as the Messiah of God. As such, they began to live the lifestyle that Yeshua preached, which was a Jewish lifestyle. Yeshua was a Jew, and followed the commandments in the Torah, as Jews are expected to do. Despite what many Christian churches try to tell you, He died being a Jew, and when He was resurrected He was still a Jew. His Disciples were Jews and lived according to Torah, as did Shaul (Paul), which he confirms in his letters to the (what was really) Messianic communities he began. The Gentiles that were accepting and following Yeshua’s teachings were given 4 immediate changes to their (prior) Pagan behavior (Acts 15) , which was only the starting point for them. James said that they would learn the words of Moses in the synagogue every Shabbat, which clearly indicates it was expected of these converts to Judaism that they would, eventually, follow the lifestyle outlined in the Torah just as Yeshua, His Disciples and the early Jewish followers of Yeshua did.

But that’s not what happened. What happened was a combination of misunderstanding of many of Shaul’s letters (no real surprise there- he wrote like a Pharisee, which he was, meaning his logic and statements were drawn out and somewhat convoluted), geopolitical activities that made being Jewish in a Roman controlled land dangerous, and human’s trying to enforce their will on people who didn’t know any better (I am referring to the early “church” elders.) The “Judaizers” , as they are called, that Shaul talks about in Galatians were trying to get the new converts to accept circumcision as a necessary part of salvation. Shaul blasted them for that, and much of what he wrote seems to say the Torah is not important, but instead the Spirit is how one should be led in his or her worship of God. That is, of course, correct, but he didn’t mean to ignore the Torah. Shaul was saying to let the Spirit lead you to obey the Torah, but not to gain salvation through obedience; what Shaul meant was that we should be led to be obedient to God as a thankful and loving expression of faithfulness.

As things got politically worse for the Jews, those Gentiles becoming Jewish decided that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to embrace Torah as much as the Jews, since they were being targeted by Rome. So they stepped away from total observance of, or even trying to observe, Torah.

In other words, the Gentiles that were now worshiping the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (instead of the Roman gods) decided that they were going to worship their own way, and break from traditional Judaism.

In other words, the Gentile Believers dumped the Jews.

As time went on, the (now called) Christians began to separate even further from their roots; their leaders changed the Sabbath day, created their own holidays, canonized the writings of the Jewish Disciples without a single Jew on their Council, and even started to denounce living a Jewish lifestyle, announcing officially that if you were living a Jewish lifestyle you couldn’t be “saved.”

Today, the separation between Christian worship of God and Jewish worship of God is so different it is almost at opposite ends of the pole. Thank the Lord that the proper Spirit, the Holy Spirit (Ruach HaKodesh) of God is beginning to lead Christians back to Him and to the proper worship of Him. The Messianic Christian and Hebraic Roots movements are making headway in the Christian world. People are beginning, in these End Days, to know the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as He wants them to know Him. More and more churches are supporting Israel and wanting to observe Torah for the correct reasons.

The correct way to observe Torah is not as a means to gain justification, and not as a means to prove ones worthiness for salvation, but because that is what God said we should do. Through observing Torah we will earn blessings (Deuteronomy 28), but more than that, God has given us the Torah so that we can have life eternal; the life we gain through Torah is not gained by performing the actions correctly (what Shaul calls “legalistic” observance) but because of our heartfelt desire to please God and  the simple fact that observing the Torah demonstrates by our actions our thankful and loving faithfulness.

That is what Christianity lost when it dumped the Jewishness of it’s worship. It cut itself off from the very root that feeds it. In  my not-humble-enough opinion, the main reason there are so many different Christian religions is because they have no root, no foundation upon which to settle themselves. They are, as Yeshua warned, a house on sand, being shifted and blown in all directions because they are not solidly rooted on the Rock of God’s Word.

Until Christianity comes back to the root, it will forever waiver, change and grow further away from God. Judaism is not a religion, it is a way of life; it is not a set of rituals and rites so much as it is the form of worship God commanded. Christianity thinks it is grafted onto the Tree of Life, but it has mutated itself so much that it is no longer even the same species.

I pray that the Prodigal Son returns soon.

Faith vs. Legalism

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As a Messianic Jew I am not liked by anyone. My Jewish brothers and sisters tell me that because I believe “in Jesus” (almost none of them really understand what that means) I am no longer Jewish; on the other side, because I follow Torah (as best as I can) and maintain a “Jewish” worship and lifestyle, my brothers and sisters in Messiah tell me I am legalistic and not really saved because I am “under the law” and not “under the blood.”

Both are just so very, very wrong.

Shaul (AKA Paul, that nice Jewish tent maker from Tarsus) tells us in Romans, Chapter 4 all about legalism and faith. He begins at the beginning, with Abraham, and identifies how the Tanakh confirms that Abraham was considered righteous because he believed what God told him would happen. That faithfulness, demonstrated by Abraham believing in what hadn’t yet happened, was why God credited him with righteousness. There was no task he accomplished, or behavior he performed, other than believing.

But that wasn’t all: Abraham did more than just believe. He did all the things that God told him to do, without hesitation or complaint. He left his father’s house, he left his neighbors, his home…everything he knew and was comfortable with, and took everyone and everything he owned to…he had no idea where.

When God told him to cut up animals and lay them out, he did that and remained out in the heat of the day, shooing away the birds.

When God said to circumcise himself and everyone else, he did it that day.

When God said to take Isaac and sacrifice him, he left early the very next morning.

Whatever God said to do, he did.

So, even though Abraham’s righteousness came from trusting faithfulness in what God said, he also spent his life doing what God told him to do.  We call that obedience.

Going back to Romans 4, Shaul points out that circumcision had nothing to do with Abraham’s righteousness because the righteousness was credited before he was circumcised; because of that, Gentiles who are not circumcised can be saved without undergoing the procedure, but if one chooses to do so, as an act of obedience, it doesn’t mean that person is being legalistic.

The difference between legalism and faith is simply the reason for performing the act: if I do what is in the Torah because I want to obey God, that is not legalism. If I do what is in the Torah to make me righteous, I am being legalistic. Of course, if I can obey Torah perfectly, I will be made righteous by doing so; the problem with that scenario is that no one can obey Torah perfectly. Therefore, there has to be a better way. We call that way “Grace”, God’s forgiveness for our sins, which is possible through believing in Yeshua, whose sacrifice replaced the need to bring a sacrifice to the temple in Jerusalem to have our sins forgiven.

This is why Yeshua had to die: because the temple wasn’t going to exist, which means the sacrificial system God created for us in the Torah would no longer be available, Yeshua’s sacrifice replaced needing the temple to receive forgiveness of sin.

If I live my life trying to obey the Torah because it is what God said I should do, and I do it to please God and out of respect for Him, then I am not being legalistic: I am being obedient. Just as Abraham was obedient. Do any of you doubt, even for a nano-second, that if God had given the Torah to Abraham back then, that Abraham would not have tried to be 100% in compliance with everything in the Torah? Of course he would have. And not to be considered righteous, but simply because God told him it is what he should do.

The Torah is NOT just for Jews- it was given to the Jews, who God said are His nation of priests to the world, to live it as best they can in order to be an example to the rest of the world how they should live. If you don’t want to worship the God that is in the Old Covenant writings, then ignore the Torah. But if you choose to ignore God’s commands, for whatever reason, I don’t think we will be playing Cribbage in the Acharit Hayamin (End Days) together.

It all comes down to what is in your heart: believing Yeshua is the Messiah and being faithfully obedient to Torah as a “labor of love” will result in receiving His Grace; obeying Torah just to earn your way into heaven is a direct route to somewhere, but not where you will want to be.

Have a Happy Shavuot

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We began the holiday of Shavuot last night (5/30/17), which is also called Pentecost (50 days) and is celebrated by both Jews and Christians. I think this is the only holiday that Jews and Christians celebrate together, although for different reasons.

You know…even within Judaism Shavuot is celebrated for a different reason than it was originally created. In Leviticus 23:15-21 God decreed we celebrate this day:

 “‘From the day after the Sabbath, the day you brought the sheaf of the wave offering, count off seven full weeks.  Count off fifty days up to the day after the seventh Sabbath, and then present an offering of new grain to the Lord.  From wherever you live, bring two loaves made of two-tenths of an ephah of the finest flour, baked with yeast, as a wave offering of firstfruits to the Lord.  Present with this bread seven male lambs, each a year old and without defect, one young bull and two rams. They will be a burnt offering to the Lord, together with their grain offerings and drink offerings—a food offering, an aroma pleasing to the Lord.  Then sacrifice one male goat for a sin offering[c] and two lambs, each a year old, for a fellowship offering.  The priest is to wave the two lambs before the Lord as a wave offering, together with the bread of the firstfruits. They are a sacred offering to the Lord for the priest.  On that same day you are to proclaim a sacred assembly and do no regular work. This is to be a lasting ordinance for the generations to come, wherever you live.”

We have been counting the Omer ( a unit of weight) until the 50th day after the first Shabbat after Passover. In other words, we have the Passover Seder, then the Festival of Firstfruits (Habikurim), and then we start to count the 50 days until Shavuot (which is the Hebrew word for “weeks”) when we perform both a sin and a fellowship sacrifice.

The Holy Day (meaning God decreed) of Shavuot was an agricultural celebration, but this has been replaced by a spiritual celebration. The Rabbinical holiday (meaning man-made) celebrates the giving of the Torah to Moses on Mt. Sinai. The Torah, itself, doesn’t mention this as part of the festival; neither is it mentioned as the reason for this festival in the writings of either of the accepted historians of this time period, Josephus and Philo.  From what I could find, it is believed that Maimonides (also called the RaMBaM, an acronym for Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon), who lived in the twelfth century, is the Rabbi that associated Shavuot with the giving of the Law.  This means that the Holy Day of Shavuot was celebrated as God told us to do so for about 2600 years after Moses, then it became a holiday created by Maimonides. In fact, the Torah could not have been given on Shavuot. Here’s why: we read in Exodus 19:1 the following statement:

In the third month after the sons of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that very day they came into the wilderness of Sinai.

They left Egypt on the 15th of Aviv, and we are told in Exodus that this day (the very day they left Egypt) is to be the first day of their year. It took 90 days for them to get to Sinai, which is already more than 50 days after Habikurim. Even if we try to fit the time line in by using some convoluted counting based on which Shabbat is really the first Shabbat after Passover, we still have to add that God decreed all the men should prepare themselves for 3 days before approaching the mountain (Exodus 19:10):

 And the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes and be ready by the third day, because on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.

So, it was no less than 93 days after the Israelites left Egypt that they even came to the mountain. Then, we have Moses up there for 40 days and nights, so the law was being given to Moses, but hadn’t been received by all of Israel yet. As you probably already know, the law took even longer than that, since Moses destroyed those first tablets and it was about 1 1/2 to 2 months later that he came down with the tablets that (finally) were saved in the Ark of the Covenant.

Likewise, even though the Christian celebration of Pentecost is to commemorate the giving of the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit), Pentecost is a Greek word meaning “50 Days”, so the Christian celebration of Pentecost is celebrating a holiday whose name represents a totally different event.  Yeshua (Jesus) never mentioned that He would send the Comforter on any specific day, just that they were to wait until it arrived. I contend that because Yeshua made no direct reference to receiving the Spirit on Pentecost, that Pentecost is a uniquely Jewish Holy Day and Christianity should have given their celebration a different name. I am guessing that because the early Believers were still mostly Jewish, and this spiritual indwelling occurred on a Jewish Holy Day (at that time Shavuot was celebrated as God said it should be), that is how the name Pentecost was forever associated with the pouring out of the Holy Spirit.

So what we have is this: Shavuot (weeks) and Pentecost (50 days- this name came from the Septuagint) are the same Holy Day, which has been turned into a holiday by both Jews and Christians, who each celebrate it for a different reason than what God created it to be.

If you have read my book (Back to Basics: God’s Word vs. Religion) you would know that I do not appreciate Holy Days being turned into holidays. However, I do make an exception for Shavuot because the relationship between the giving of the Torah, which set us apart as holy and represented freedom from slavery to men, and the giving of the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit), which set us apart as holy and helped to free us from slavery to sin, is a really good thing. It helps to bring together Jews and Christians, even if not for the same reason. It is (at least) some form of common celebration from which we can come closer together in our worship of God.

What we have today is this: The Holy Day God decreed is still being celebrated by both Jews and Christians. From the Jewish side, we have changed the reason for the celebration to one that (by all means) does deserve celebration: the giving of the Torah to Moses. On the Christian side, they celebrate the giving of the Holy Spirit, which is the Comforter and giver of Truth to help us stay on the road of righteousness.

Torah tells us what God expects of us and defines sin so that we can avoid it; the Ruach HaKodesh helps us to recognize sin, and when we surrender to it, will also direct us to stay on the path of righteousness. Both Jews and Christians have this in common with their celebration of this day: we are thankful to God for His direction and for the gifts He gives us in order to help us have eternal life.

Shavuot is a very joyous celebration, and whether you celebrate the gift of the Torah, or the gift of the Ruach, or (as Messianic and Hebraic Roots congregations do) celebrate them both, have a very happy and blessed Shavuot.

 

hebraic roots and messianic judaism: two sides of the same coin?

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I am a Jewish man. I was born a Jew, from Jewish parents of Russian descent. I was raised in a Reform Jewish environment, and since neither of my parents ever really embraced being Jewish, my B’rit Milah (circumcision) and Bar Mitzvah were as much a “This is what we do” thing as it was a spiritual acknowledgement of my covenant with God. When I grew older I forgot about religious observance, and always felt distant from God yet desiring to be closer. What kept me away was my desire to sin, which constantly overcame my desire to know the Lord for some 40-odd years. It was a series of traumatic events that led to my desire to know God, and a determination to finally either know Him or reject the whole thing, once and for all. Thankfully, I did get to know God, and then I also needed to know the truth about this guy Jesus, who most of my life I was told was Jewish but started His own religion and was someone we Jews killed.

Now I know who Jesus really is: a Jewish man named Yeshua ben Yosef, who is in truth the Messiah God promised would come, who was born Jewish, lived a Jewish life and died Jewish. He was still Jewish when he was resurrected. During His life He observed the Torah and never-ever started a new religion (for the record, modern day Christianity is from Constantine, not Yeshua.) So, now that I am still Jewish (I am not a Christian, a Christian-Jew, a Hebrew-Christian or anything other than a Jew) but have accepted Yeshua as my Messiah and recognize that He is the son of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that means I am no longer just a Jewish man, but I am a Messianic Jewish man.

Messianic Judaism is not Jews for Jesus. Jews for Jesus is an organization, a non-profit company with a “religious” mandate to bring the truth of the Messiah to Jewish people. One of the things that I wish they would do is stop sending Jews willing to know Yeshua to Christian churches. Not that Christian churches are a bad place, but most Christian churches are not Hebraic Roots churches (Oy! Another label!) and many, many Christian churches have a “don’t need Torah” attitude, and (worse than that) some are Replacement Theologists.

The Hebraic Roots Movement is similar to Messianic Judaism in that Messianic Judaism is for Jews (and Christians, too- most Messianic congregations I have known actually have more Gentiles than Jews) who accept Jesus (Yeshua is the preferred name) as the Messiah, but still maintain the Jewish lifestyle and worship rooted in observance and obedience to the Torah. Hebraic roots congregations are Christians (and some Messianic Jews, like me) who desire to get to know and worship the Lord as Yeshua did, worshiping as they did in the First Century.

Essentially, if a person is someone who has accepted that Yeshua/Jesus is the Messiah, and worships as the followers of Yeshua did in the First Century when He walked the earth (and for about two centuries after that), then they are either Messianic Jews (if they are Jewish by birth) or Hebraic Roots Christians (if they are Gentile by birth.)

Same coin, different sides.

By the way- this is obviously a very simplistic explanation. I am hoping that it is effective in getting across the idea that anyone who worships the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who accepts that Yeshua was born a man by Divine conception, who believes He was and still is the Messiah God promised in the Old Covenant writings, is thereby one in the body of Messiah. And, whether or not they were born Jewish, Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist, whatever- when they accept Yeshua as their Messiah, they also accept His lifestyle. Which was, as we would label it today, Judaism. In fact, more similar to Orthodox Judaism than any other sect within Judaism.

I worship at a Hebraic Roots church (zionistrevivalcenter.org) and am one of only maybe 3 or 4 Jewish-born members. We are very small, no more than 15-20 or so “regulars” but we will, with God’s blessings, grow. I believe there is a growing desire in the Christian world to get closer to Jesus, since most of what He really is and what He really taught has been thrown out and replaced with Christian rhetoric, ritual and Anti-Semitic diatribe (such as the Replacement Theology claim that God has rejected the Jews for rejecting Yeshua, and Christians are now the “Chosen people.” Really? I don’t think so- God is pretty clear about His devotion and love for the Jewish people throughout the Bible.)

The aim of this blog-ministry of mine is to help people understand that God doesn’t have any religion, just rules. His rules were given to us in the Torah and the Torah is meant for everyone. It is not, and was never meant to be, exclusive to Jews. It was given to the Jews to bring to the world.

Whatever belief system you have now, does it respect the Torah? Do you believe (or have you been told to believe) that the Torah is valid for everyone? Do you believe that God still expects you to obey the laws of Kashrut outlined in Leviticus 11? Do you honor God by celebrating the festivals God said we are to celebrate and in the manner He described in Leviticus 23?

Or- do you believe (or have been told) that the Torah is only for Jews? Were you taught that Jews receive their salvation from Torah but Christians are saved by the Blood of Christ? Do you believe that the only things in the Old Covenant that are valid for you are the “moral laws” that God gave the Jews? If so, you have a very rude awakening coming to you.

Here’s the truth- the biblical truth that you can verify in the bible- Yeshua lived and worshiped as a Jew. The Disciples lived and worshiped as Jews. Shaul (Paul) never “converted” to Christianity- it didn’t even exist then! The followers of Yeshua were Jews who met in the synagogue or, if under social or political attack, met in their homes but NEVER stopped worshiping as Jews. There was no “church” in the first century- the “church” (as we know it today) was formed by Constantine and the Council of Nicene a couple of centuries after Yeshua walked the earth. The truth, my friends, is that if you believe Jesus is the Son of God and you claim to worship Him, than you should be worshiping God, not Jesus, and worshiping God as Jesus did.

I see bracelets with “WWJD” on them, and hear all the time that Christians should do as Jesus did and walk as Jesus walked, yet the Christian world teaches (for the most part) to do nothing like what Jesus did, and to walk a path Jesus would never have even thought of walking! Consider this: the world is about to celebrate the birth of the Messiah and enjoy a holiday feast in His honor with food that He would have considered an abomination to see on His dinner table! I am talking about the traditional Christmas Ham, of course. When you think about it, eating ham on a day designed to celebrate Jesus’s birth is, in fact, disrespectful to God and to Jesus.

The end is always coming closer. That is just simple math- our timeline moves in one direction, and the end is at, well…the end, so every day, every hour, every breath brings us all closer to the final judgement. And the real kicker is that we don’t know when the end is! Bummer! That means that the best possible time to get yourself right in accordance with God (through Yeshua) is now. Right now. And that means if you haven’t accepted your own sinfulness, now’s the time to get with the program. We all hear about asking for forgiveness, but the truth is until you accept your own sinfulness and inability to overcome it, there’s no desire to ask anyone for forgiveness. So, first and foremost, we have to accept and “own” our sinful nature as being against God and we have to want to change it, to do T’Shuvah. Then, and only then, will our request for forgiveness through Yeshua’s sacrificial death on our behalf, be honest.

Next, accept that the truth that God’s will is for us to live as He said we should, which is defined and outlined in the Torah. Yeshua taught nothing but what is in the Torah- He respected it, He observed it perfectly, and he taught others to do so. He never, never, never taught anything against or outside the Torah. What really happened is God gave the Torah to Moses, the people added too many rules and regulations on their own and when Yeshua came to earth to teach the truth, He upset the “religious” authority by telling people that it is God’s authority that counts. We were only looking at the words of the Torah, and Yeshua taught us the spirit of the Torah. And He was all about the Torah and all about God.

If you want to  worship God in a way that will please God, then doesn’t it just make sense to worship God as He said to worship Him? To live your life in the manner He said to live it?

Duh!

 

 

 

God’s word is the same for everyone

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Here I am, sitting at home, writing in my blog and wondering how much longer I will be able to go before the caffeine (actually, lack of caffeine) headache starts to hit. Last night began Yom Kippur, and we had a Kol Nidre (Hebrew for “All oaths”) service. Despite technical issues, it went well. Normally there would be prayer services all day, which makes the time go by faster, but not this year. Maybe, if we grow more and get enough people who want to celebrate this day in prayer, we can hold the evening and all day services, as well.

I was talking with someone last night who was drinking something from a cup as we talked, and this person has been a Believer and Hebraic Roots Christian (the other side of the Messianic Jew coin) for a long time. Yet, here he is, drinking in front of me knowing that I am fasting.

He was telling me of plans for a break-fast together at the house of one of the people who has a home fellowship meeting every Wednesday, and they usually bring food and eat at around 1830 or so. Of course, Donna and I were invited but we have our own traditional break-fast that we have done for nearly 20 years and have no desire at all to stop doing: it’s called the Outback Steak House!

Anyway, back to the story: so, I tell him that it would be too early to eat since the sunset isn’t until around 1930, and you wanna know what he accused me of being? He accused me of being “legalistic”! He has no idea what an insult that is, and no idea of what he was talking about, either. Legalism, as Shaul (Paul) used it in the letter to the Galatians, means to follow the Torah only as a means to attain salvation; in other words, we do what God says so we can be saved. I don’t do what God says to be saved- I do it because God said to do it. God didn’t say to do it half-way, or in whichever way is easiest for us, or whichever way we want to. God said this is what you are to do, and this is how you are to do it. Period.

I am not really mad at this person for the sin he accused me of. He needs to re-read the word of God, and include those sentences that come after what he wants to believe. Such as when, in Acts 15, the Elders told the newly-converting Gentiles that they are expected to do 4 things. That was not the end or entirety of their expectations. The letter sent to the Gentiles who were converting to Judaism- if you followed Yeshua that is what you were doing- said that they need to immediately stop eating blood, stop eating anything strangled, stop eating anything devoted to an idol, and to stop fornicating. But that wasn’t the end of it-there was more. Most Christians like to think (or have been taught) it stopped there, and that all the other commandments in the Torah were left up to the individual Gentile to take it or leave it. Not true.

As Paul Harvey would have said, “And now for the rest of the story…”. These four commandments, so to speak, were to be immediately adhered to by new converts, but all the rest of the Torah was not thrown out- the next sentence says that these new converts will be hearing the laws of Moses in the synagogue every Shabbat. Why did they say that, if the Mosaic law (Torah) wasn’t important? They said that because the point is that these 4 restrictions are just the start, not the end, of the process these new Believers would be going through. These 4 restrictions are what the Elders felt could be reasonably expected from Gentiles who have spent their entire lifetime without any restrictions. To throw the full weight of the Torah on them, all at once, would be too much to expect of anyone. Even the Jews, who were expected to fulfill every command of Torah and who had been raised from infancy with those restrictions, even they still couldn’t obey them completely! To throw them all, all at once, on the Gentiles was unreasonable, and would only result in creating a stumbling block in their path to salvation.

That’s why I say we all need to read the next sentence. The Elders clearly expected that these converts would now be leading a Jewish lifestyle, and going to Synagogue every Shabbat where they would hear the words of God and learn the Torah. And, as such, it was expected that they would, eventually, be able to take on the fullness of the Torah.

The statement made to me by my brother last night, which was that Jews are expected to honor the entire Torah but Gentiles don’t have to, is ridiculous. It is nearly blasphemous, accusing God of playing favorites, and announcing that what God said is required (of those that follow Him) is not true for all people. Basically, he called God a liar.

GOD HAS NO RELIGION!  He has Torah. He gave the Torah to the Jewish people, His chosen people, who are chosen to bring the Torah to the world. There cannot be any discussion or argument against that; at least not if  you read the bible, either Old or New Covenant, and read all the sentences. And what I mean is that you don’t just read what you want, pull something from here and something from there: the entire bible is valid, from the first line in Genesis to the last sentence in Revelations. And there is nothing in the New Covenant that is new- and there is nothing anywhere that says some have to do what God says and others don’t- and there is nothing Yeshua (Jesus) said that goes against Torah- and there is nothing Shaul (Paul) said that goes against Torah.  There is nothing, anywhere, in the entire bible that says all laws are for Jews and only some are for Christians.

God is very clear that anyone who sojourns with His people, meaning anyone who wants to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and call themself one of God’s chosen, has the same rights and privileges as a natural-born Jew. That goes both ways- if you have the same rights and privileges, you are also subject to the same laws and commandments. You can’t have your Kugel and eat it, too.  If you believe in God, if you profess that you are saved because you have accepted Yeshua/Jesus as your Messiah and Savior, then you MUST honor His word and worship Him as He said to.

And how we do that is in the Torah.

When Yeshua died for our sins, it did not release us from obeying God’s word. I am spending today, this very moment, fasting and praying for forgiveness NOT because Yeshua’s sacrifice doesn’t cover me, but because I am still a sinner, and because God commanded that this day, the tenth day of Tishri, is a day to be devoted to asking for forgiveness. The fact that Yeshua has covered my sins doesn’t mean I don’t ever have to ask to be forgiven anymore.

Think about it: if you don’t ask for forgiveness of a sin, that means you don’t really feel any remorse, and if you feel no remorse, then you can’t be repentant. Yeshua’s sacrificial death will not save a sinner who is unrepentant.

I fast this day because God said to, and that means the entire day, sunset to sunset, as God decreed it should be done. That’s not legalism, my friends, that is called worship! That is called devotion! That is called demonstrating my love for God by being obedient!

My friends, my brothers and sisters out there somewhere, reading this now- I pray that the truth of God’s complete plan of salvation is fully revealed to you. I pray that the forgiveness provided by Yeshua’s sacrifice, which is the ultimate demonstration of God’s willingness and desire to forgive you when you do T’shuvah (repentance), is not diluted and perverted into some form of license to ignore Torah.

Thanks to Yeshua, I will not go to hell if I eat ham, and with or without Yeshua, I will not go to heaven just because I don’t eat ham. However, if I chose to obey the laws of Kashrut in Leviticus 11, I will demonstrate my desire to please God, to obey Him, and I will earn blessings for obedience.

Obedience brings blessings- it is the promise of God (Deuteronomy 28)-do you have so many blessings that you don’t want any more?

Do you feel that you don’t need to ask for forgiveness? Have you lead a totally sinless life since you accepted Yeshua? Do you think that just because Yeshua died for your sins you don’t have to stop sinning? What is a sin? Isn’t it disobeying God? If God said, “This is what you are to do”, and you refuse to do it, for whatever reason, isn’t that a sin?

If you think that because you are a Gentile you don’t have to follow the Torah, you are wrong. Sorry, don’t mean to burst your “Buffet Believer Bubble” that you can obey what you want and ignore the rest. But, the truth is that everyone, whether or not they accept God or Yeshua, E–V–E–R–Y–O–N–E is required by God to do what He says to do. That is the truth. If you doubt me or disagree with me, that’s your right- God gave us all free will to decide for ourselves. It is not just your right, it is your choice, your decision, and whether or not you make it because of what you believe the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) has told you, or what your religious leader has told you, or just simply what you would rather believe because you want to- it is your choice.

And when you come before the Lord, God, Almighty- and we all will come before Him – you will be held accountable for whatever choice you have made.

That is why I pray you make the right choice: the choice that is right in God’s eyes.

May God bless you all with peace, joy, wisdom and discernment.

And may you have an easy fast.

Paul never converted

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I really can’t stand it when I am reading Acts 9 and the paragraph title is something like this: Paul’s Conversion on the Road to Damascus”

First of all, his name wasn’t Paul- it was Shaul. and second of all, he NEVER converted.

Historically, there was only one other religion at that time for him to convert to in that area of the world, and that would be the pagan Roman religion. I think everyone can agree Shaul didn’t convert to that.

During the First Century C.E. in Israel there were Jews and Romans- that was it. Among the Jews some accepted Yeshua as the Messiah and followed Him as such, and others (the majority) did not. But they all followed Judaism. There were also some Romans who accepted Yeshua as a Messiah and they converted- to Judaism!

The name “Paul” was used for him when the written accounts (some becoming scripture) were translated into Greek.

Shaul never converted. He was a Pharisee, he was a real “Jew’s Jew”, and his entire life was spent practicing Judaism.

In Acts 18:18 Shaul proves his Judaism by taking a Nazarite vow and sponsoring others to do so. It is clear from the writings in Acts and from his own letters that Shaul never, ever, not-even-once said anything about not being Jewish. He never said to disobey or ignore the Torah, he never said he converted, he never said that Gentiles should not follow the Torah.

Throughout the book of Romans Shaul is writing an apologetic for Torah- he is saying that following Yeshua is not ignoring Torah. And that Torah is still valid- a very Jewish viewpoint.

In 1 Peter 4, the word “Christian” is used. I do not believe that the other two times, both in Acts, that the word “Christian” is what the original writing had. The people who followed Yeshua in the First and Second Century were the first Messianic Jews, and the word “Christian” was used (most likely) by scribes copying the written accounts down in Codex A and Codex B much later, when the term Christian was widely used. They just (naturally) used it when copying and condensing the texts. The word that was most likely used originally would have been “Christiano’s”, which in Greek has no real meaning. The scribes “knew” that these people were Christians because that is what they were called then, so they just wrote “Christians.”

There was no “church” in the First and Second Century, either- you can thank King James for using that term, despite being told it was incorrect. I guess when you are the King you can even re-write the bible any way you want to; like they say, “It’s nice to be the King!”

The use of the word “Christian” in 1 Peter was, in fact, used as a derogatory term. Shaul said he would accept it because he knew what following Yeshua really meant.

If you are Christian, or Jewish, or thinking about accepting Yeshua, please do not be fooled by the subtle (or sometimes not-so-subtle) anti-Jewish bias of most New Covenant interpretations. The people who followed Yeshua in the 1st and 2nd Century C.E. were Messianic Jews (composed of Jews and pagans who were in the process of converting to Judaism.)

Let’s look at Acts 15:19-21:

19 “It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. 20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. 21 For the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.”

I purposely bold printed verse 21 because that sentence is proof that the only conversion that occurred was from Gentile to Jew. When James told the Council of Elders (all Jews, by the way) to have only those 4 restrictions, that wasn’t the end-all of it. That was just the beginning, because (as he said) they (the Gentiles converting to Judaism) will be learning the law of Moses every Shabbat. “…read in the synagogue on every Sabbath.” clearly indicates that the Jewish religion and the Jewish lifestyle is what was expected from the Gentiles who accepted Yeshua.

Shaul was never called “Paul”; Yeshua was never called “Jesus”; Jews and Romans who followed Yeshua were not called Christians until many years after He was resurrected, and only then as a derogatory term. It wasn’t until Constantine and the Council of Nicene that Christianity, as we know it today, began. Before then it was Jews, Jews and Gentiles who accepted Yeshua (Messianic Jews), and Pagans.

Shaul was, always remained, and still is a Jew.  Just like Yeshua.

L’Shanah Tovah! (Happy New Year)

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It’s 5777.

I had someone tell me, just yesterday, that this should be a very good year. The number ‘5’ reminds us of the 5 books of Moses (Torah) and of the 5 divisions to the Psalms. The number ‘7’ is probably the MOST powerful number in the bible. It represents completeness, as the world was completed in seven days; the 7th day is the Sabbath, the word for luck, Mazel, is equal to the number 77, and when the bible wants to emphasize something, it says it three times.

So, if you’re into numerology, 5-7-7-7 should be a very good year.

Of course, the entire celebration is not really a new year celebration according to God. In Leviticus 23, the chapter that gives us the Festivals of the Lord, this is Yom Teruah, the Day of Trumpets (also Yom Ha-Zikaron, Day of Remembrance.) It begins the 10 Days of Awe, a period of somber and humble introspection as we approach Yom Kippur, our Day of Atonement. During this time we are to review our past year with emphasis on how well, or how poorly (in most cases) we did with regards to doing that which pleases God.

The new year celebration is actually a holiday, not a Holy Day, as I define them: Holy Days are what God told us we must celebrate to Him, and a holiday is what men have created to be a day of celebration. Therefore, Yom HaZikaron is a Holy Day, a day of remembrance (as defined by God), but Rosh Hashanah is a holiday, a Rabbinic ordinance that tells us to celebrate the beginning of the year. It is a civil new year. The religious, or spiritual, new year is when God told us it is to be, which is the first day of Nisan: the first day of our freedom from slavery in Egypt.

Exodus 12:1-2 “ Now the LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, “This month shall be the beginning of months for you; it is to be the first month of the year to you.” 

So, since the holiday of Rosh Hashanah is not decreed by God- in fact, it is in conflict with the Holy Day God said we should celebrate- should we ignore it?

Good question. I wish I had a good answer!

My book goes into this in the chapter regarding Holy Days vs. Holidays. All I can talk about is what I do- I worship God as He said we should (well, I do not do a very good job of it, but I keep getting better) and when there is a conflict, if we can call it that, I try to do what would please God. Since God said this is a day of remembrance, I think we should look inside ourselves and try to determine how to be better next year. And when we celebrate the American (worldly) new year in January, don’t we do that as part of it? Don’t we sing, “Auld Lang Syne”? Don’t we look forward to a better year?  Don’t we wish each other better success as we move into the future? Don’t we make resolutions (just to break them) to improve ourselves?

I do not see a real conflict between celebrating the day of remembrance as a new year, so long as we do the things I described above. Instead of a conflict, I see it more as just a different spin on the idea of remembrance.

For me, I want to hear the trumpets call me to remember, call me to look inside, call me to gather myself together to work towards being a better “me”, a more Godly “me”, a “me” that will please the Lord more in the coming year. And a “me” that is thankful, humbly and respectfully, for the forgiveness I already have though Messiah Yeshua. I will not abuse that forgiveness by taking advantage of His promises; I will not trample the blood of Messiah into the dirt by using His sacrifice to allow me to half-way atone.

As I prepare for Yom Kippur, and celebrate these Days of Awe, this time of holy introspection and review, I do ask God to move from the Throne of Judgment to the Throne of Mercy- not for myself, because Yeshua has covered my sins, but for my people, for all people, so that they may look inside and see the spirit of God we all have and recognize their sinfulness.

Only when we are willing to “own” our sin can we truly begin to give it away.

Enjoy this new year; may we see the return of Israel to her land and the coming of Messiah Yeshua on clouds in majesty and power! Hallelujah!!

L’shanah tovah tiketavu!

What is “Jewish stuff?”

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Have you noticed all the Halloween decorations in the department stores? Pretty soon the candy sales will be all over the place, and before the first little kid tries on his costume, they will be putting up Christmas lights along Main Street. Everyone is getting ready for something that is still a month away.

Yet, how many Gentiles realize we are in one of the most Holy of all periods, right now? These are the 40 days before Yom Kippur, and starting on the evening of October 2, Erev Rosh Hashannah (the eve of New Year) we will begin the 10 Days of Awe, when the Jewish people are supposed to introspectively review their commitment to God and to realize how close to (or how far from) meeting what God wants of them.

On the evening of October 11 we begin Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when we fast and pray all day for forgiveness for our sins, which we humbly and constantly remind ourselves we have committed against God. We are praying that He will move from the Throne of Judgment to the Mercy Seat, and inscribe us in the Book of Life.

As a Messianic Jew I am often asked by Christians why I fast, since Jesus (Yeshua is His real name) died for our sins. My answer is very simple. It is as complete an answer as I believe anyone can give, and as complete an answer as anyone who worships God should accept. My answer is, “Because God said we should.”

I fast because God said I should. Not because Yeshua died for the sins I have committed (which He did), not because I am not fully forgiven by God (which I am), and not for the sake of honoring and communing with my Jewish brothers and sisters (which I do): it is because God commands us to do this.

Leviticus 23, and other parts of the Torah, specify that on this day we are to afflict our souls, which nearly everyone agrees means to fast. I do it because I am Jewish and it is what Jews do, but I do not do it because it is “Jewish stuff”: God gave the Torah to the Jews not for them only, but for them to bring to everyone else!

Christianity has been teaching that the Torah is for Jews, but that is a wrongful teaching- the Torah is for everyone. What is being called “Jewish stuff” is really “God-fearing stuff” and anyone (more correctly, everyone) who professes to believe in God is supposed to do it.

The bible is absolutely crystal clear- the Jews are God’s chosen people, chosen to be priests to the world (Exodus 19:6; 1 Peter 2:9) and to represent Him to everyone else. A Priest is not the only one who serves God, is he? No- the Priest is the spiritual leader of the community who acts as intercessor between the people and God. That is the function of the priest. So, to do what God commanded us to do is not just worshipful, or God-fearing, or even holy (although it is all of those things, too): to obey God’s Torah is so much more than just being “Jewish.”

I have had many Gentile’s come to me over the years and tell me how proud they are that somewhere in their family history they have recently discovered a Jewish Grandparent or a Jewish ancestor. They are so happy to be “real” Jews.

I think they want to be Jewish for all the wrong reasons.

If you want to be Jewish, then do what a Jewish person is supposed to do- honor the Torah by obeying it. Honor God by obeying His commandments without trying to box this one in and shut that one out. Don’t be what I call a “Buffet Believer“, picking and choosing whatever commandments you like, rejecting the rest and using Yeshua as your excuse for disobeying God!

If you don’t feel comfortable identifying with Judaism, then obey the commandments because that’s what Jesus did. How many Christians wear that silly bracelet with the “WWJD?” on it, but don’t do anything that Jesus would’ve done? He would’ve fasted on Yom Kippur, you betcha!

The term, “Jewish stuff” is a demonic slur created by the Replacement Theologists who are, in truth, the Synagogue of Satan Yeshua talks about in Revelations 3:9. They want to be Jews but reject the one thing that identifies Jews as Jews- obeying the Torah.

Hey, listen up! GOD HAS NO RELIGION! He has rules for worshiping Him, and rules for treating each other, and that is what He gave to the people who were descendants of the one man God chose to represent Him to the world, Abraham. It is only by geographical and linguistic relationship that we call those who follow the Torah, “Jews.”

Shakespeare said, “What’s in a name?”; to paraphrase the rest, “That which we call a “Jew” by any other name, would still follow Torah.”

Don’t be concerned with what your religion tells you about how to worship God; you must read God’s word on your own to learn what He wants from you. Then do it to the best of your ability.

Yeshua’s death did not free us from Torah- it freed us from the results of our failure to follow Torah perfectly. His sacrificial death was never a means to avoid Torah- His life, His teachings, His very existence is all about Torah: Yeshua is the Living Torah!

Forget Jewish; forget Christian; forget religious titles and canon. These things are useless to The Lord; all He wants is for you to do what He said to do so that you can live with Him eternally.

 

Where’d we go wrong?

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Before we can answer where we went wrong, we need to understand what is wrong.

What is wrong is that Christianity, for the most part, isn’t following Christ. It is following Constantine. The majority of the Christian world knows the Torah saves the Jews and the Blood of Christ saves the Christians. These two are as separate from each other as East is from the West, yet the entire basis of what Jesus taught was wholly and exclusively in the Torah. What Paul wrote in Romans has always been used as a polemic against the Torah, but it is the exact opposite: it is an apologetic for the Torah. Every place that Paul talks about the Torah failing to save people (because of the Rabbinic use of a strictly legalistic interpretation) he asks if that means that the Torah is dead or no longer valid. He answers that question, in every case, with a very enthusiastic, “God forbid!”

Go on- read it for yourself! The Christian world only reads the part where he says Torah fails, it never talks about the rest of that statement where Paul confirms Torah is valid and necessary and what we should observe.

That is what has gone wrong. I liken this to the Looney Tunes cartoon where Elmer chases Bugs into a tree, and Bugs is sitting out on a branch. Elmer takes a saw, and sitting on the junction of the branch to the bole, he saws through the outer part of the branch so that Bugs will fall. However, after he cuts through, the branch miraculously stays up by itself, and the tree holding Elmer falls. This is exactly what the Christian teachings are expecting you to believe- that you can cut yourself off totally from the root of salvation, i.e. Torah, and not be affected by that.

Christianity went wrong in the Third century when Constantine decided Christianity was OK, and as a (now) reformed pagan, he commercialized Jesus (that hasn’t changed much, has it?) by changing all the major pagan holidays into Christian holidays, and by separating Christianity from Judaism, once and for all.

A little history prior to this: Rome expelled Jews for their rebellious attitude after Yeshua’s (Jesus’s real name) resurrection, and later around 132-135 CE under the Bar Kochba rebellion, Rome destroyed the Jews (580,000 dead, 50 fortified towns and 986 villages razed- it was a massive defeat.) They totaled the Temple and even renamed Judea to Philistia (Palestine) as a final insult, sort of like throwing salt in the wound as they were kicking them laying on the ground.

NOTE: Philistia, or Palestine, was the Roman equivalent of Philistine- they renamed the land God gave to His people after the historic enemies of God’s people.

Now when Constantine “converted”, being Christian went from meaning “lion’s diet” to “government approved”, but Judaism was still on the “Least Wanted List” to Rome, so as more and more Gentiles accepted Yeshua (now being called Jesus more often than His given Hebrew name, Yeshua) and being recognized as “Christians” instead of as converted pagans (converted to Judaism), Judaism was becoming something that you did not want to be associated with. So, when Constantine and the Council of Nicene (of course there wasn’t one Jew on the Council) created what is the foundation of today’s ecumenical laws and church canon, the total schism of Jews and Christians was completed.

The Council of Nicene is, to me, the “where” of where we went wrong.

So, the question now is, what do we do about it?

For the majority of the Christian world, the answer is: nothing. Why change it?

I can understand their desire to leave it as it is; after all, most people don’t like change, and especially when change means accepting that the teachings you have had, from people you trust and admire and (even) love, have been sending you father away from God than closer to Him. And, like it or not, that is what any teaching which identifies the Torah as not valid does- the Torah is God’s word to mankind. It isn’t just for Jews: it was given to the Jews to bring to everyone else.

That is what being the “Chosen” people means- chosen to bring Torah to the world.

My answer to what do we do now is what I am doing- getting the truth about Torah, about Christianity, about Judaism, and about God to you, to the person next to you, to everyone and anyone who will listen, and yes- especially to those who don’t want to hear about it! Like that nice Jewish boy from Tarsus- you know, the one who makes those beautiful tents- said: those who know Messiah have the smell of death to those who don’t accept Him.

The church I worship at is not a Messianic synagogue, it is a Hebraic roots church, For my money, these are two different terms for the same thing. We represent the “One Man” ideal- Jew and Gentile together worshiping God as He said we should, honoring Torah and knowing that what Torah cannot do for us (only because of our nature preventing us from living Torah perfectly), Yeshua has covered through His blood sacrifice.

The Christian world teaches that because Yeshua died you can be saved, and that is correct, but they teach it in a way that doesn’t give freedom from sin but gives license to sin! They teach that you are OK, that Yeshua made it all OK, and you can live your life pretty much anyway you want to, so long as you don’t murder or steal, because Jesus has got your back. They say Torah is no longer valid if you accept Jesus (which is the exact opposite of what Jesus and all His disciples taught) and what is even crazier is that, back then, if you were Gentile and accepted Yeshua, you were converting to Judaism because that’s all there was then-pagan or Jew. Today, if a Jewish person wants to accept Jesus, they are told they have to reject Judaism and convert to Christianity.  If Jesus was here in the flesh, I can only imagine what He would be telling the Popes and the Bishops and the Pastors and the A of G and WCC and all the other “Christian” organizations about what they are teaching.

And I am sure He would have a few choice words for the Jewish equivalents of those organizations,too.

What went wrong was separating Jesus from Torah, and where we went wrong was the Council of Nicene. The path to true worship of God is through obedience to the Torah and acceptance of Yeshua ha Maschiach as the Messiah.

In a nutshell: God gave the Torah to the nation of Israel and assigned them the job of Levite to the world. They were to show everyone else how to live within the laws and guidelines of Torah. Because mankind is sinful by nature, the Torah, in and of itself, was too much for us to obey perfectly, so God provided for us a second option: Yeshua the Messiah. His death was the ultimate sacrifice for sin and His resurrection the proof that His sacrifice was accepted. When we accept that Yeshua (Jesus) is the Messiah God promised to send, and by accepting Him we worship God in accordance with God’s instruction in the Torah (to the best of our ability), we have Yeshua’s sacrifice to “fill in” where we fail to meet Torah’s guidelines.

The truth is that Yeshua’s sacrifice was not a replacement of Torah but only an addendum to it. The “New Covenant” (found in Jeremiah 31:31) did not replace the Old Covenant (Mosaic Law); it simply added to it. The covenants from God have never been exclusive of each other- they are inclusive and each new covenant from God is built on the prior covenant, confirming and expanding it. From Noah to Abraham to Moses to David to final fulfillment in Yeshua- every new covenant has been built upon and contains all the prior covenants.

Yeshua is the word of God in the flesh, and the word of God is the Torah. How could Yeshua, in any way at all, preach against Himself?

You need to decide, for yourself, what is the right path for you. I hope you see the truth in what I am saying here, which is only what God, Jesus and all His Disciples (the ones that were with Him) have said- obey Torah, worship God and accept the truth that Yeshua is the Messiah.

Ask for the Ruach haKodesh (Holy Spirit) to guide you to know the truth and use the gifts God gave you to glorify Him in all that you say and do. I pray for you all, that God will open your eyes to what He has for you, and what He asks of you.