We have all heard that the word of the Lord never returns unfulfilled, but does the word ever not return?

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Let’s look at the entire statement, Isaiah 55:10-12 (CJB):

“For just as rain and snow fall from the sky and do not return there, but water the earth,
causing it to bud and produce, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater;
so is my word that goes out from my mouth — it will not return to me unfulfilled;
but it will accomplish what I intend, and cause to succeed what I sent it to do.”

OK, someone may say that rain and snow which falls to the earth does return eventually through evaporation. Yet, for the rain or snow that is absorbed by the earth and ends up as sustenance for the plants or animals, that doesn’t really return, does it? That is the rain and snow that accomplishes what God sent it to do- bring life.

We know that God sent his word into the world, to the Jews first and then to the rest of the nations (Goyim), instructing us all how to worship him and how to treat each other, yet there are so many who haven’t made any adjustment to their sinful lives, so what’s up with that? How can God say his word never returns unfulfilled for the purpose he sent it, yet here we have an undeniable truth- most of the world has ignored it, including most of the Christian religions who profess to worship him!

It seems we have a real conundrum: we know that what God says he will do, will be done. Period. But yet, here we have his word sent to the world, but his word doesn’t seem to be accomplishing what God sent it to do.

I could use a Predestination view (which, for the record, I do not believe in) and say that those who do not hear the word were never meant to hear it, and that nicely answers the problem of how it can not return unfulfilled.

But I don’t think that is the real answer.

I am thinking of what Yeshua told his Talmudim as he sent them into the world (Luke 10), when he said as they come to a house, to give it their “Shalom”, and if the house returns their shalom, to stay there. That meant that if the place they came to was open to hearing the word, then their shalom, i.e., the message of peace, will return to them, meaning that its purpose to teach them how God wants them to live, will not be unfulfilled.

God’s word is to teach us how to be righteous in his eyes; however, when his Torah (meaning teachings) fall on deaf ears, it is the shalom that was not returned.

What I am trying to say is that when God’s word is has been spoken to those who are willing to listen to it, it returns to God fulfilled. However, if the word sent falls on deaf ears, it will not return to God.

The fly in the ointment is Free Will- God’s word is life eternal, but for those who refuse to listen, the purpose God sent his word to fulfill will not be accomplished. Not because of any inability of God’s word to accomplish his purpose, but because of our ability to reject that word.

So there’s the answer to the conundrum: the only word that returns to God is the word that has fulfilled its purpose. The word that is ignored does not return to God, but like rain falling in the ocean, or snow falling on a mountaintop already full of snow, it has no impact or change to what is already there.

God’s word is a powerful medicine that can cure any disease, but if it is not taken by the person who is sick, its purpose is unfulfilled.

Thank you for being here, and please remember to subscribe and share these messages. That’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Depending on the version you read, Shaul refers to the Torah (Galatians 3:24) as either a guardian, custodian, or even as a schoolmaster (KJV).

But whatever which way that Greek word was interpreted, it shows that the Torah was all we had at that time to teach us how to be righteous in God’s eyes.

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To understand this passage, as well as anything we read in the Bible, we need to ensure we are looking at the entire context of what was being written, to include what comes before and after the passage, and to interpret it within the context of the entire paragraph, letter or book, who wrote it and to whom, and why.

Briefly, Shaul is writing to the Galatians who are under pressure from the Jewish population to make total conversion to Judaism in order to be saved. This strict adherence to the letter of the law, in lieu of faith, is what we know as “Legalism”. Shaul was trying to convince the Gentile Believers that they needed to be faithful, first and foremost, because following the Torah (which is too often incorrectly thought of as being “under the law”) was only to be the way until the Messiah came.

In other words, to put it without all the “Jewish logic” that Shaul uses (Jewish logic is my term for how we Jews argue- we will tell you everything something is NOT before we tell you what it is), the Torah was given to us to teach us (as a guardian or schoolmaster) how we are to act in order to be righteous in God’s eyes, and thereby to be given eternal life. i.e., to be “saved”.

The point Shaul was making is not that the Torah was not needed anymore because through Yeshua we can be saved, which is the traditional Christian use of this passage, but rather that through the faithful trusting in Yeshua as the Messiah, we can be saved not just from death, but from our failure to obey the Torah completely.

You see, the bottom line (unspoken in so many ways) is that the Torah IS life eternal, and that was proven when Yeshua was raised from the dead, which was the result of his having lived in 100% obedience to the Torah for 100% of his life.

Yeshua was the epitome of Torah obedience, which is why he never saw decay and was resurrected to eternal life in God’s presence. The truth is, people, if any one of us could do that, then we would also be resurrected to eternal life.

The problem us is that no one can do that, which is the very reason God sent us the Messiah. Through our faithful acceptance that Yeshua is the Messiah God promised, we can find forgiveness of sin.

Look- being righteous in God’s eyes can never happen if we are stained with sin, and the way we are saved is not really just through faith in Yeshua, but through being forgiven of sin. The faith in Yeshua is the means by which we are forgiven, and being forgiven is the path to eternal life.

Yeshua is not salvation: he is the means by which we can be forgiven of our sins, and when we are no longer stained with sin, we can live in God’s presence.

Now, as for the guardian no longer being necessary, let’s think about what a guardian does: he or she guards us (DUH!), but from what? The guardian guards us from making mistakes, from being hurt or hurting others, and prepares us (as a schoolmaster) to know what we need to know in order to survive in the world when we are on our own.

When you were in school (under a guardian), you learned about the world, you learned about science, social studies, history, art, etc. When you graduated, you were no longer under that guardian, but let me ask you- when you were no longer under the guardian, did you reject and ignore everything that guardian taught you?

This is what Shaul meant when he said that through faith in Yeshua, the guardianship under the Torah was not needed anymore because through Yeshua we could find the one thing that the Torah, alone, offered us to be saved: forgiveness through the sacrificial system.

That system didn’t exist after (approx.) 70 AD, when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, and from that moment on, the only path to God (meaning being able to be cleansed of sin) was through the forgiveness we receive by means of Yeshua’s sacrifice.

When we leave school, or reach legal majority at which time we no longer require a guardian, what we learned from our experience under that guardian is (hopefully) going to be the foundation for a successful and meaningful life. Proverbs 22:6 says,

“Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it“.

The same is true for the Torah as our guardian- it is to teach us the way to go, specifically the path to salvation, and so under the Torah we learned how to live, how to worship God, and how to treat each other. Certainly, Shaul would never have meant that all of that was to be rejected in lieu of faith in Yeshua!

The Torah teaches us all that we need to know to be faithful to God, and to live a righteous life. Yeshua taught us the deeper, spiritual meaning of the Torah, fulfilling not so much the law as the new covenant God made through Jeremiah (Jer. 31:31), which said that he would write his Torah on our hearts. Yeshua taught us how to have the very “heart” of the Torah on our hearts, but never to ignore it; neither did any of the disciples or apostles teach to ignore the Torah.

The Torah was our guardian, teaching us what we need to know to be righteous, and it is still a valid and necessary to anyone who professes to believe and worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as it was when God first gave it to us through Moses. The only thing that as changed is how we receive forgiveness: because we cannot do so under the Torah (no temple to bring our sacrifice), we now find that forgiveness of sin through the sacrifice Yeshua made, and that means of forgiveness (which is, again, how we are saved) is only available to those who accept Yeshua as their Messiah, the one God promised to send.

That’s how it works- the Torah as our guardian taught us how God wants us to worship him and treat each other, and just like you do not reject or ignore all that you were taught in school, the Torah is as valid today for everyone worshipping God as it has always been.

Yeshua is the means by which we can be forgiven when we sin, replacing the need to bring an animal to the temple, but he did not replace the Torah, or the need to be obedient to God’s commandments.

That’s it for this week, so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

Too often I have heard people say that all they need to be saved is faith in Christ, but then James said that faith without works is dead.
They say Jesus did away with the law, but if that is true, doesn’t that lead to the conclusion that through Jesus, there is only lawlessness?

So what IS the relationship between faith and works?

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Faith is believing, simple as that. So, when someone says that they believe in Yeshua what do they mean?

My experience is that nearly everyone who says that has no idea what they mean, and can’t come up with any better explanation than that they believe he is the Messiah.

So what? Every demon in hell, and the guy in the red suit with the pitchfork also believe he is the messiah, so are they saved? Do they go to heaven?

I don’t think so!

Faith is believing without proof (Hebrews 11:1), but true faith cannot be invisible. As James said, true faithfulness in the belief Yeshua is the Messiah means you must also faithfully believe in God, and that means also faithfully believing that God is in charge, the ultimate authority in the Universe.

With me so far?

So, if God is the ultimate authority, and we believe that, then why does Christianity base all its tenets and laws on what Shaul (Paul), a human being, says?

The only answer is that they never really had faith in God, but rather placed their faith in a human being because (this is what I believe!) what he said was easier to do than what God said.

And people are still that lazy, today, which is proven by how many people come against my messages of Torah obedience being for everyone who professes to believe in God, as being wrong.

If you truly believe that God is in charge, and the ultimate authority, and that he loves his children, then you have to accept that he gave us the Torah (first to the Jews to learn, then as his nation of priests- see Ex. 19:6– to bring to the Goyim/Nations) for our own good.

The Torah is where God, himself, directly instructs us how he wants us to worship him and how he wants us to treat each other. Have you ever considered how Christianity can say it is God-fearing and God-ordained, when it has, for millennia, taught to ignore the Torah, God’s own instructions?

It’s really very simple, but very hard for Gentiles to accept- faith and works cannot be exclusive but must be inclusive. Works without faith is legalism; it is a performance-based salvation and, as such, will never be successful.

On the other hand, faith without any demonstration of that faith, is just so many words, and I learned this truth long ago: people don’t mean what they say, they mean what they do.

Jimmy had it right all along: if you are truly faithful to God, and truly faithfully believe Yeshua is the Messiah and that he taught us the true, spiritual meaning of the Torah, then you MUST be obedient to the Torah as the demonstration of your professed faith.

You can make up all the excuses that Christianity has taught its followers for millennia, but I tell you- absolutely- that when you come to face God at Judgement Day (which we will ALL have to do), and tell him that you did everything those men at your church told you to do, I won’t speak for God, but I am sure he will reply with something to this effect:

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

Thank you for being here; that’s it for this week so l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

There are many statements about salvation, one of the best-known being “All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Joel 2:32)

And in the New Covenant, we are told that all who believe in Jesus will be saved (Romans 10:9)

But what is being “saved”?

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Before I tell you what I believe being “saved” means, let’s go over what is doesn’t mean:

1. It doesn’t mean all your sins from now on are automatically forgiven (this is called OSAS- Once Saved, Always Saved). If you do not repent of a sin, honestly repent, and ask for forgiveness, it won’t be forgiven.
2. It doesn’t mean that you (and those you love, too!) will not suffer the consequences of your sins committed on earth; being saved is not a “Get Out of Jail Free” card.
3. It doesn’t mean that you can never lose your salvation. True, no one can take it away from you, but we all have to realize we can backslide, and even reject the free gift of salvation through continuing to sin without repentance.

So, now, what I believe being saved means is simply this: when you accept that Yeshua (Jesus) is the Messiah God promised to send, and that he taught to obey the Torah as a result of faithfully trusting in God and wanting to do as God says out of love for him and not as a means of legalistically obeying the Torah (which means trying to earn salvation), at Judgement Day Yeshua will be there for you, to identify you as one of his sheep, and through his righteousness you will be able to live in God’s presence for all eternity.

God’s actual “new covenant” is not in the New Covenant writings, also called the Christian Bible. No- it is found in the Tanakh (“Jewish” Bible) in Jeremiah 31:31, where God says he will make a new covenant, not like the old one, because this time he will write his Torah on our hearts.

And to have that done you need to understand more than just what the Torah says, you need to understand what it MEANS! That is what Yeshua taught us- the deeper, spiritual understanding of the Torah God gave to the world.

And this can be best found in Yeshua’s Sermon on the Mount, where he tells us it isn’t enough to not kill, we must not hate in our hearts. Also, it isn’t enough to just not commit adultery, we mustn’t so much as lust with our eyes.

You see? These are not just legalistic (ooh, there’s that word, again!) actions, performed as rote acts of righteousness, but they are heart-felt emotions! We do not do what God says is wrong because we are not like that, it is no longer a part of our make-up because our hearts have his Torah written on them.

This is what Yeshua brought to us; this is the real new covenant, the real means of being saved.

So, get to know the Torah (if you don’t, already) and take it upon your heart. Make it something you don’t just know, but something you breathe with every breath, see when you close your eyes, speak of when you walk by the way, and take with you when you arise and when you lie down.

If you have the Torah on your heart, which I believe is only possible when you accept Yeshua as the Messiah, and thereby will apply them to your life, repenting when you sin and always asking God for forgiveness and strength to be better, you will be truly “saved”.

Thank you for being here and please remember to share these messages and subscribe to this ministry.

That’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

If you are wondering where I have been for the past two weeks, Donna and I were vacationing in Ireland. We had a great time, and later I will post a video of our travels you can watch from my website. You will find it under the Picture Album tab.

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Before we start, let’s take a look at the passage I am talking about:

No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old coat; if he does, the new patch tears away from the old cloth and leaves a worse hole. And no one puts new wine in old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the skins will be ruined. Rather, new wine is for freshly prepared wineskins.”

I have often heard the Christian interpretation of this passage to indicate that Yeshua was teaching that the Torah was no longer applicable to his disciples or followers, because he was giving them something new.

And, to a degree, they are right: Yeshua was teaching his listeners something new… but it wasn’t a new religion rejecting obedience to Torah, it was a new attitude towards how to obey the Torah!

You see, throughout the Gospels, one recurring theme that Yeshua taught was how the Pharisees only taught the P’shat, i.e., the plain language meaning of the laws in the Torah. Yeshua taught the Remes, the deeper, spiritual meaning of those laws, which is truly what the “new covenant” is all about (read Jeremiah 31:31– THAT is the new covenant!)

What Yeshua was talking about was not the Torah, but the attitude we are to have regarding the Torah. We are not just to do it, rote, like some automaton just going through the motions, but we are to live it in our soul, in our heart, in our very essence: we are to BE Torah!

In order for that to happen, the people had to change their understanding of what the Torah really means, and to change their attitude towards God, towards obedience, and especially towards the teachings of the Pharisees.

If they liked what Yeshua taught but continued to live and worship as the Pharisees taught (especially regarding their demands to obey their man-made requirements), then they were like the new patch on old cloth, the new patch being Yeshua’s teachings about the spiritual meaning, but the old cloth being the Pharisaical teachings which left no room for expansion of understanding.

In simpler terms, hearing Yeshua’s deeper understanding of the Torah, but still doing as the Pharisees say will not allow them to expand (stretch) their spiritual being to be more in line with God’s new covenant. That means trying to incorporate Yeshua’s teachings (a new patch) but living the way the Pharisees say to (the old cloth, which can’t stretch), something will have to give. And, sadly, as the parable of the Sower tells us, it will likely be the new teachings.

Therefore, if you have been taught that to follow Yeshua (Jesus) you need to ignore the Torah, you have been taught incorrectly: at least, according to what Yeshua taught.

Salvation is more than just Torah obedience, and it is more than just faith in God and accepting Yeshua as the Messiah- it is loving God with all your heart, soul, and mind (does that sound familiar?); and, when you do that, the Torah will be written on your heart, and you will be a new patch on new cloth, and new wine in new wineskins.

Thank you for being here, and that’s it for this week. Until next time, l’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!

We read and hear about God’s Grace all the time; it may describe an action from God, it can also describe a prayer said before a meal, but it is not forgiveness.

When we read or hear about “God’s Grace”, it is usually associated with forgiveness, which leads to salvation, but the God’s grace is not really a thing, like the Holy Spirit, which we can feel and have living inside of us.

Grace is not God’s forgiveness; it is his willingness to forgive.

I know, I know… what the heck is that supposed to mean?

Alright, you know that when we sin, we separate ourselves from God’s presence. Every sin, no matter what it is or who we sinned against, is – first and foremost- against God. King David knew this when, after sinning against Bat-Sheba, Uriah, and even Yoab, he said his sin was against God, and God alone (Psalm 51).

Now, being separated from God’s presence and deserving of nothing but punishment, as per God’s rules, we need to be forgiven in order to once again be with God. And, for that to happen, God gave us the sacrificial system (Leviticus 1-7), and later (actually, much later) he sent to the world his Messiah, Yeshua, to replace that part of the sacrificial system dependent on the temple in Jerusalem which, after 73 A.D., wasn’t there anymore.

The sacrificial system is the example of God’s grace; without that system, there would be no way for us to be forgiven. Likewise, the sacrifice Yeshua made replaced the need for an animal sacrifice at the temple, which was (at that time) the only place we could make a sin sacrifice (Deuteronomy 12).

We also see an example of God’s grace in Ezekiel 18:23, where he tells us he doesn’t desire anyone to die, but rather that they turn from their sin, and live.

Can you see, now, that God’s grace is not a thing, but his willingness to forgive us? More than his willingness, it is his desire to forgive us, even when we sin against him, so long as we are truly repentant.

Yeah, being truly repentant is a big part of receiving forgiveness. If you aren’t really upset that you sinned against God (remember- every sin is against God), then it isn’t likely that God will forgive you, grace notwithstanding, because God isn’t stupid. If you sin and don’t care that you sinned, you won’t be forgiven.

Get real, people! God wants to forgive us, but he won’t forgive an unrepentant sinner, and you can’t fool God!

So, nu! I hope this message has helped those who have always thought God’s Grace is his forgiveness, to now know better. Forgiveness is based on confession (which means that you recognize you did sin), repentance (feeling remorse for having sinned), and sacrifice (now available through Messiah Yeshua).

God defined the sacrificial system because he knew that we wouldn’t be able to overcome sin on our own, and his grace, which comes from his desire to be in communion with us, is why he created that system of forgiveness.

Thank you for being here; that’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Throughout the Bible, we see that the way the kings of Israel and Judea (Northern and Southern kingdoms, respectively) worshipped was forced upon the people, and when the kings did what was right in God’s eyes, they were all blessed; but, when the kings did what was wrong in God’s eyes, everyone suffered- even the people who were not doing evil.

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In the Northern Kingdom of Israel, also called Shomron, their kings never did anything that was righteous, from the first king, Jeroboam (who was anointed by God!) to the last king, Hoshea, who rebelled against the king of Assyria, resulting in the final destruction of the Northern Kingdom and the distribution of the people into the Diaspora.

In the Southern Kingdom, we had good and bad kings, usually skipping a generation, until the kings got so bad (with Manasseh being the worst) that they, too, were conquered and sent into exile in Babylon.

I believe the term “collateral damage” accurately identifies those righteous people, living under unrighteous leadership, who are forced to suffer because of the sins of their leaders. We see this often throughout the Bible, but more than that, it has been a part of world history, even to this very day.

I do not want to make this ministry a political platform, but when we see the unrighteous and sinful- yes, sinful- ways our leaders are acting and the laws they pass, I can’t help but recall the biblical events that are absolutely the same.

The unrighteous leaders would remove any altars to the one, true God and erect altars of the pagan gods in their place, forcing the people to worship them.

Here in America, today, we have removed any reference to God from our schools and replaced it with drag queens read stories to kindergarten children.

We have honored and encouraged homosexuality by assigning a special day to celebrate it, and now even passing laws that allow children to choose a different gender, even when they haven’t yet reached puberty, which they need to go through to know what it is like to be the gender they were born with.

The government financially supports abortions, making murder legal (so long as the living being is still in the womb). Have you ever asked yourself, how long will it be before they allow the next step, which would be to immediately euthanize a baby the parents decided wasn’t as healthy, or the right gender, or whatever they want it to be?

America’s leadership is helping to financially and militarily support, through the gifts of millions of dollars and billions of dollars of top secret, military equipment, the enemies of Israel. What did God say about that? Wasn’t it something to the effect of “Treat my chosen people well and I’ll bless you, but screw with them and I will mess you up… bad!”? (Genesis 12:3, and yes, God said it differently than my paraphrasing.)

Our economy is worsening at a frightening rate, and there is no confidence in our leadership to control it; the crime rate in many of our major cities is climbing, yet the government of those cities, which is mostly of the current political party in the White House, is allowing those criminals to go free.

And what about the invasion of our country by anarchists, who are here to destroy the morale and safety of American citizens? They are being housed and given health care by the government, while veterans who have risked their lives to protect Americans, live on the streets!

America is, I believe, in the same situation where Judea was after Manasseh was king, when God told the people, through Jeremiah, that the end was coming, and their best bet was to work within the punishment they deserve.

Thomas Jefferson is credited with saying:

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

Sadly, I don’t believe that as bad as things are today, which isn’t really that much worse than they have been in America’s past, that we will ever see a revolution here in America. And as far as a civil war, well, I don’t see a military civil war happening here, but we are in a sort of social civil war; it appears to me that we are politically at polar opposition with each other, but what is really sad is that it is not based on political views, per se’, but on how people feel about Donald Trump!

How did we digress so far as to have the country so emotionally at odds with each other, divided because of one man’s personality?

You know, it isn’t really about that man; it is because we have become a godless and sinful country where people are more interested in the personality of their leaders than their abilities and competence in caring for and protecting American citizens.

We aren’t voting for someone, we are voting against someone, and when the choice of leadership for a country comes down to choosing the lesser of two evils, that country is in big trouble!

My political platforming is over, and the message is this: when your leaders are sinful, God will punish everyone under that leadership. The obvious answer is for the righteous people to get together and remove those leaders, and in America the only way to do that is through the elective process, which is also corrupted. And, as a life-long student of American history, you can believe me when I tell you that this isn’t a recent thing, either.

So, what do we do? My suggestion is one of two things: leave the country or, what I would rather suggest, make sure that you are right with God because that is the only way you can be sure that after the tsouris is over, whether or not you survive it alive, you will be with God when you die.

I know that isn’t very comforting, but how can I give you a pleasant future when history shows us that all who have done as our leaders are doing, have suffered greatly?

Bad news, but necessary to hear, so please share this message! Otherwise, while we are still doing OK, let me say that’s it for this week, l’hitraot, and as much as possible, please have a pleasant and restful Shabbat this weekend.