We all know God gave many different commandments to Moses during the 40 years in the desert, but have you ever considered that God never gave any other commandments, anywhere else, throughout the rest of the Bible?
I think that’s because God figures that when he says to do something, we should do it. Do you agree?
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If you do agree, then can I ask you this question: do you try to do what God said to do, or do you do what your religion tells you to do?
For example, God says to rest on the 7th day, which is Saturday. Even the Gregorian (Christian) calendar has two starting days: Sunday for the non-business week and Monday for the business week, so the standard calendar used by most everyone in the world starts on Sunday, which means the 7th day is Saturday.
Yet most every Christian sabbath is on Sunday, the first day of the week, not the 7th, which is a rejection of what God said to do.
Here’s another example: in Leviticus 11, God tells us there are certain animals that he considers unclean and that we should not eat, but nearly every Christian I have ever known, even within Messianic Jewish synagogues and Hebraic Roots Churches, totally ignore that rule.
I hate to say it, but many Jews do, as well.
And, just for the record, as far as God is concerned (hey, this is not my opinion but is stated in the Bible), when we ignore or refuse to do what God says, he sees it as rejecting him. Remember what God said when the people called for a king (1 Samuel 8:7) (CJB):
Adonai said to Sh’mu’el, “Listen to the people, to everything they say to you; for it is not you they are rejecting; they are rejecting me; they don’t want me to be king over them.”
You know, I hear so many excuses why it is okay to reject God’s Torah, but most people have no idea that there are different commandments, rules, laws, ordinances, etc. that are in there, which go beyond the Big 10.
Did yo know that the Torah has a penal code defining which crimes deserve what punishments? Did you know that it covers interpersonal relationships, defining what is proper and godly and what is perverse and sinful? The Torah tells us how God wants us to worship him, defining which days to celebrate and how we should act on those days. And most important of all, it tells us how to live in order to please God and how to be holy, as he is holy (which is, by the way, another Torah commandment).
God has rules he gave to us Jews to teach the world. How do I know? Because he said so!
Read Exodus 19:6– God tells Moses the Jews are to be his (meaning God’s) nation of priests, and since we already had our own priests, the Levites, then the other 11 tribes must be priests to whoever else there was, which was the Goyim, the nations… in other words, everyone else in the world.
There are many good reasons to obey God: to please him, to be a worshipful believer, to earn blessings (Deuteronomy 28), or to show that we trust him; but the bottom line is this: obedience demonstrates the level of our faithfulness.
If someone you love asks you to do something, won’t you do it for them?
Yet so many people say they love the Lord and in the same breath say that they don’t have to obey his Torah because his son did away with it.
Yeshua, however, often said that he does everything his father in heaven tells him to do. So if Yeshua was faithfully obeying his father, how can he then tell everyone else they don’t have to?
There can be no argument that ignoring the Holy Days specified in Leviticus 23, the rules for food in Leviticus 11, the 10 Commandments in Exodus 20, or any of the other commandments God gave throughout the entire Torah is a rejection of God.
I don’t give a hootenanny what you priest or pastor or minister or even your rabbi tells you- if God said to do it, do they outrank God?
Despite all the arguments why we should obey the Torah, and all the excuses why we don’t have to, it really comes down to this: if you believe that God is the ultimate authority and power in the Universe, why would you not obey him?
If you want to call yourself “faithful”, then that faith (as James said) MUST be demonstrated through what you do, and that really means how you worship God in your everyday activities throughout your life.
Worship isn’t what you do in church or shul, but how you live your life outside of those places.
I am going to finish with something I write very often, and pray that it will get through to at least someone, someday:
When you meet God at Judgement day, and we all will, and you tell him that you only did what they told you to do, I can’t speak for the Big Guy in the sky but I believe he might say something to this effect:
“I understand that you did what they told you to do, but it is what I say that counts!”
Thank you for being here and please remember to comment or like these messages to help me get more exposure on the Internet. And also share these with everyone you know, even non-believers. Hey, after all, you never know how fertile the soil is until you plant a seed in it.
That’s it for this week, so L’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!