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!
